The new age is here with new collar jobs. Yes, the ones that bots are creating for us!

Meaning at work gets redefined with such evolving job types! The easiest representation can be found in the way work is treated at new age offices.

What are these new age offices? Are they all about colorful walls and beautiful chairs? Why does a visionary who starts a firm spend so much to design every inch of it? More importantly when everything is destined to turn into a hygiene factor, no sooner, then why did leaders like Steve Jobs invest so heavily in creating Spaceship, which is not just a work space but work of art! Why do the firms in Silicon Valley take workplace design so seriously?

Elon Musk in a tour of his office space shows how open and connected is the engineering floor. The senior management shares the same work space along with rest of the team.

How does this impact? Let’s take a step back and reimagine the old offices that were more about maintaining hierarchy with opaque walls between each work space. Birth of the industrial revolution has placed every work flow in a batch-processing manner. Machines or people are neatly placed in rows separated by walls, cabins and cubicles. With the era of sophistication these walls were replaced with glass which brought in more light to the rooms.

As we drew closer to the end of the industrial era and more into the age of bots, the paradigm shifted from cubicle to commitment. Work is no longer about “how” but “how soon”! When result remains the only measure to work, the speed at which the work is delivered gets completely redefined.

Well these are not just mouthful of theories but action-oriented formulas that are changing organizations. With the future of work being redefined, let’s see how and where it is being developed. And this is all happening in India, right in the business district of Mumbai!

Building a 23000 people startup

Alfian Sharifuddin, Managing Director , Head of Technology & Operations – DBS Bank India, reflects, “Being deeply rooted in the traditional banking system remained time-tested and it made the transition into a 23000 people startup, even more interesting! We had to scale up not only with strategies but also with visible cues including modern workspaces” That hits the target as excel sheets, pie-charts and rising graphs comes and it starts with what we see around us! The speed of work depends on how we treat urgency. Cutting across layers remains an understatement when you are building an aircraft, while it’s flying in the air

Work happens in the white spaces and it is no longer a cliché. Open work areas that promote collaboration. Hence, why mull on an idea endlessly when you can get it resolved at the speed of thought!

Activity-based-work station in DBS Bank India headquarters at Nariman Point not just encourages a free flow of communication amongst employees but also the decision-making authority.

The transition to the ’23000 people start-up’ began with the old version of office that was replaced with thought oriented spaces, which could be accessed by employees at any level. The silos were targeted to be broken to an extent where even the CXOs weren’t allowed to personalize their office only to ensure that this doesn’t build any boundaries. Often the aura of a room portrays the impact of the discussion that is taking place in it. The presence of a leader in his/her personalized office impacts anyone entering it Much as it may help the one who might be allocated the room, it can effectively act against the one walking into it.

The thoughtfulness of the design is highlighted when the noisy area graduates to silent zones for people to focus and work on projects that require zeroing down of attention. The noise meter, put on every work zone, interestingly resembles a traffic signal that can blink in color to show the decibel level. This takes the cake on managing a healthy noise level at work, which works for all!

The fun zone has been designed with Apple TV and arena to encourage relaxed moments and celebrate lighter team moments. This spirit of enjoyment flows into work with colorful pods and phone booths.

The fish theory comes alive when the concept of fun at work doesn’t just remain restricted to the HR initiatives but is included in every day moments through fun-filled, meaningful interactions in a relaxed environment.

Open and free work spaces allow for greater interactions with the freedom to operate from any corner as deemed fit for the departments to interact. Alfian points out, “The marketing team and digital banking team interact all day long, that’s how, they are placed in the same zone just as the ground floor hosts the cash transaction team and the operations team as the documents from the bank is passed directly from the retail branch in the same building and floor. The work space is designed for the future to accommodate bots and drones. The tables would be soon enabled with wireless charging station and meeting rooms manned by Alexa or any other AI for the enterprise.”

Future of work holds gig economy and geographically based talent to its core. Hence, a meeting room with two large screens allows multi-locational video-conferencing.

How about a work space that can be transformed into a large auditorium for town halls without making any changes? Just walk up those stairs and you have a stage, as shown in the picture attached below! Would such openness to connect, allow free flow of communication on a daily basis?

Meaning@Future of Work

Dr.Brent Rosso, Ph.D., Associate Professor of Management at Montana University, defined some of the elements ingrained behind the design philosophy of such workplaces, best aligned to the Future of Work:

True calling: You needed a new disruptive and authentic one to accommodate your growth.

Make a difference: Every day you are allowed to be a part of not just the idea generation and implementation but also a part that solves the problem of your customers and you see the change in progress!

We are all in this together: An open work space that breeds belonging!

Feel valuable: Self-efficacy is synonymous with what we deliver at work. Empowerment evolves from the choice and responsibility to excel. A conducive environment that inspires authenticity creates leaders for tomorrow

Sacrifice to a greater cause: Imagine the CEO of your firm, who has worked all his life to get there, treats himself as an equal and not the stature he has achieved! Not only is the door to his office open but also his office space, which is available for others to access in his absence!

Now take a moment and look at this picture, imagine this is the work space for all that you are chosen to deliver, that builds not just your self-efficacies or your bank balance, but also the future of work that you are part of!

Yes, a job like that defines every moment with the meaning at work, a gorgeous sea view and pays you as well!

Voonik , an online fashion brand has deferred the payments for its 200 employees by 3 months. As reported by Money Control, Voonik’s CEO and Co-Founder Sujayath Ali said those who will quit the company will get a month’s salary as the severance package. He added the company “is currently one or two months away from EBITDA (earnings before, interest, tax, depreciation, and amortisation) profitability.

Subir Chatterjee, Compensation and Benefit Head says, ” Help me to understand this better. The founder deferred the salary to achieve EBIT? So far I know salary is part of operating expenses, don’t they have to book the salary as future liability? Operating Earning comes much before EBIT.”

Pratik Vaidya, MD Karma Management added, “Very few organisation understand the value of human capital & asset rather than treating as Operating expense. Audited Companies that defer salary and other incentive payables & sheepishly roll back in future when their employee leave”.

Subeer Bakshi, CHRO Bajaj Allianz reflects, “Agree that it’s going to be problematic, but it’s a well-intentioned alternative to lay-offs. That’s laudable, and I hope the employees buy in!”

What impact would this have on HR compliances to be maintained in the company. How would the EPF contribution, ESIC if any, other Retirals and tax deduction be managed by the employer in such a situation?

Mental health should have been a course we must learn since Standard 1 ! Behaviours are based on how we deal with what happens to us. God knows when would any one stop considering ‘therapy’ as a luxury and not a life-skill that everyone needs to learn.

Years back I had enrolled for a course called ‘Positive Psychology’ by Talk Shop, delivered by Dr. Mathai Fenn.

Interestingly the course wasn’t Tal Ben Shahar’s version , but an entirely new option to understand the tools that can make our choices broader. Here’s what I learnt from the course. Go learn it for your self now 🙂

What I learnt from Positive Psychology Course

Imagine yourself, stepping inside your brain. Let it be like a large bright control room with a super computer, many monitors and speakers. There are cameras, mic and other receptors, that are constantly capturing information. Every single sound gets stored with a picture in your frame. There is a meaning which you may draw from each frame. The super computer stores this and encodes that meaning into a definite trigger. For instance when you think of Santa Claus, you may instantly think of Christmas, fun and happiness. You may even hear the jingling of bells or carols. You may not revisit this frame, yet this affects you sub consciously. You may notice that, when you are giving gifts or you happen to in a benevolent mood. You might even end up referring to yourself as Santa Claus! You may not say ‘Ho, Ho Ho’, yet you would be able to refer to that same happy feeling or that euphoric state.

We have repeatedly realized that we are the result of our convictions. We may create positive statements, use possibility thinking, yet fail to achieve the result the way we wanted it. What goes wrong is, we move too fast from one step of processing information to another. Chalking out major information into firm steps holds the key. Suppose you join a course for Leadership development. You may have set goals for yourself such as, being able to explain the vision to your fellow members and bring them along with you. We understand you have a huge pressure to perform. In addition to it, you keep running out of time. You may constantly want to know, how soon can you get back to your office and start working. This is where your development process would stagger. In spite of having clear goals, the inability to chalk out and navigate from one step to another, forces you to jump into the result. This is how in spite of the repeated time management training program that your team attended, there was no unambiguous conditioning of their behaviour. They continued to miss the deadlines.•

The brain’s programming screens, even the most minuscule syntax, identifying the correlation between the information and its trigger. This entails how even a minuscule change in this coding, if made, can create a multiplier’s effect. Recently, I attended a training session on Nuero Linguistic Programming – Strategies. This session was facilitated by Dr. Dorris Greenwood. It focused on identifying these strategies. A little background to Neuro Linguistic programming, it helps identifying the neurological processes that necessitate our response thereby behavioral patterns. This includes in detail the study of each reflex our brain transcends. A systematic application of strategies as discussed here can help in identifying those reflexes, hence fine tune them towards a desired outcome in the future. It was designed to identify a negative trigger. There were two situations, which were taken, one was about learning curve correction, and the second was enhancing the emotional intelligence. On a similar note, let’s itemize this, with situations, that you come across at your work.•

Learning Curve: NLP strategies could be used to enhance the learning curve towards any concern. The issue that was brainstormed entailed, how to attune our responses to create a better learning curve and get the result we want. This interests me as each time I take up a new concept, it takes a long time to decipher them, correlate them and finally implement them. Mostly there are a series of trial and errors which I require before, I can get the concept right. I have been reading about thin slicing. This helps, you to identify each section of what you want to learn. Thereby, correlate them to what comes easily to you. Ultimately use this acquired intelligence to implement the new learning. In a competitive environment, the result often gets measured by comparative rankings and ratings. This robs the leeway to learn. Furthermore, it may completely circumvent, learning many new concepts in a shorter period of time. In the worst case scenario, the learning curve transforms into a loop of relearning and practicing endlessly.

Emotional intelligence: This was identified as those points where we are just about to lose a winning game. For e.g.: You have allocated work for the next one month. A day into the new workflow and two of your employees go absconding. You discuss leave plans and a change in the workflow management, with your team members. Just as you have explained every limitation to them, they end up opposing you. They reject the workflow management as undo-able due to resource crunch with unavoidable reason for leaves. Your first reaction would reason it out. After a prolonged discussion, when you have shared logic to validate your point, you suddenly find your team members just shoving off your suggestions. You may not want it to run out of your hand, consequently, force it on them. This kills the entire process which you had envisioned in the first place. You end up being autocratic rather than a smart leader. Your work may get delivered, but you live in a constant fear of losing more employees due to such stringent circumstances.

Implementation of strategies

Cues are clubbed under different groups, including the visual, audio and kinesthetic. Kinesthetic includes the motor skills, which paces up the information processing. Each information stored as syntax coupled with the cues, creating positive and negative response. The loop is made by repeating this syntax. This results in a trigger. It is either positive or negative which saps the energy making you un-resourceful. The key to implement the strategy is to identify this negative trigger and replace it with a positive one. It proceeds with each visual, audio and kinesthetic concerning level for each cue. This means even the smallest information that you have probably ignored has been coded by your brain in such a way, that it attenuates a bull-whip effect on your learning cycle. The steps to implement the strategies include the following:

Test – Set your strategies into a script and test them.

Operate – In case the strategies set doesn’t show the result, creating a new metaphor and anchoring them to the script is essential. This includes re framing to an extent.

Test – Rehearsing the new script to find the perfect fit.

Exit – The goal to the process needs to be seen clearly. Dissociating at the point where the goal is achieved is essential to mark an end to the process.

Winning script for learning curve

Suppose you are learning something very difficult. What is the first thing that happens to you?

Most of the time it is nervousness and thoughts of when did you do something like this.

Now take a minute and try to hear or see when you are nervous.

Let’s take a case, where you don’t see or hear anything, you just get the feeling.

Just take another minute and step into a situation where you are about to learn something challenging.

Let yourself feel nervous. Just concentrate on what you see or hear.

You might hear a noise may be a constant noise and see objects such as stars.

Listen deeply, to what the noise is all about. Does the noise scare you?

Listen intently, how does it sound? Let’s assume it’s a constant beep.

Change that beep sound with chirping of birds or music- it could even be your favorite song

Listen to it for a while. If you need a positive statement, include it.

Just as you see the stars replace it with flowers- daisy and lilies

What is your favorite flower? If its rose, choose to replace the stars with roses

Now take a minute and move ahead, through each step to the end of the learning cycle. See yourself going through every chapter with confidence and added intelligence. Finally see yourself at the end of the course, with the desired outcome. It can be the merit grades you wanted or even an implementation of what you have learnt.

Picture yourself there, with the knowledge and wisdom you set for yourself.

See that you have gained and learnt all you could and are rightly capable of implementing it.

Look at the values that you are generating from what you have learnt take a minute and let this feeling completely seep into you, revisit this feeling, each time you decide to learn something. Now choose anything, in the recent future that you will have to learn.

Repeat the process all over again.

Winning script for higher emotional intelligence

Similarly, use this script with a variation to increase your emotional intelligence. Step into a situation where your best intentions are being drawn out of proportion. Suppose you have just distributed appraisal letters. You distributed the best raise judiciously among the value creator and productive team members. However, just as they see their new salaries, they are indifferent. Their expectation was way more than what has been offered to them. They come to you and share their dissent.

Now take a breath and pause for a while. Picture yourself as Santa Claus or any other visual where you are happy with your employees. It can be the last team party you had or the sudden pizza party you declared. Visualize this. Add your favorite music and see yourself smiling. If you need a positive statement , include it.

Now return to your present state, where you have your employees speaking angrily. Look at them and see them as the human beings you have always valued. When you do this, observe what you say. The chances are that, you would remain calm and finally share the reason. They may or may not buy what you say, yet they would calm down as they listen to you.

Remember you cannot change other’s behavior. You can fine-tune yours. They may have situations forcing them to take up a role with a higher pay or move into their preferred location. Even if, the reasons are beyond your control, you will establish yourself as a leader of repute in their minds. If they see it more often, they would realize the benefits of working with a leader as smart as you

Try this now, in your mind. Imagine a future challenge and see yourself responding intelligently to it. Repeat the process until, every feeling of letting situations run out of your hands vanish. This practice, e.g. mindfulness would build your natural capabilities to respond in those situations.

Let us know, did it work for you? We are waiting, we have a mind to hear your experience!

The frugality of the situation and their inter-changeability remains the driving force to strategy. Even though, it is defined, as a set of planned actions over a period, to achieve the desired result. Organization mirrors this, as the business target to reap the profit. The business goal percolates to every function, over arching with one organization goal. HR functions identify the people factors in this goal. The strategy set for the year drills down to individual functions connecting the business units. Connecting different requirements put the functions on the same page. For instance, the broad-banding of a strategy, such as building agility, would echo for recruitment with greater in-house expertise, where as payroll may require errors free, as its prime target.A case as shared as below in ‘Concern’, surfaces the tip of an Ice berg, with the challenges in Strategic HRM. This is a part and a parcel of talent management. Every organization aims to hire the best talent and retain them with best compensation. Hitherto, the gap between perception and reality edges employee dissatisfaction.

Concern: Recently we have hiked the salary of one of our employee after reviewing her overall performance. However, she is not happy with it. She is been expecting more. Every day she reminds to negotiate an increase in her salary. Please help on how to handle this situation.

The case facts:

The compensation planning allocated hikes to each grade and rank, attenuated by the performance standards.

The employee is presented with the hike , which do not match the expectations.

Ordeal of negotiations for another hike lengthens decision making.

Looking glass

Logical thinking coupled with practical situations brings in the solution. Three dimensions that attributes to strategy are as discussed below:

Goal Setting: The objective may be defined, as being the market leader by the next financial year. This is calculated in terms of business target. Mostly it’s an increase in the market share through either takeovers or increase in the production. This configures the goal setting for each function. HR functions for such a growing firm would strategise to designate responsibilities, to facilitate the expansion.

Budget Allocation: The sum total of the spending is divided into investment in terms of benefits and other operational expenses. Compensation is identified as the value returns on the services received from the talents. This is chiefly governed by the business requirement such as higher spending on research, leading to planning for larger markets share, amid higher supply chain. The HR budge would impact with an alignment to the market is weighed to offer a competitive compensation.

Leadership alignment: The backbone of the success to planning lies in the hands that delivers it. The leadership team designated to set the strategy and prepare budget are accountable for the business units. The talent planning may be chaired by a CHRO , however the insinuations are contributed by the business leaders. Communication overarching the environment balances the transparency, strengthening trust.

Balancing Act

Judging a situation with logical findings would require a non-attached discernment. In our member’s case, different implications from three dimensions as discussed had lead to the dissonance. The disbursement of the hike matched the top-down judgement, but missed on the discernment.

Future of Work

Individual perception of performance and result: A contribution by an employee is valued. It results with rewards when they were aligned to the organizational goals. Dashboards and performance scorecards actualise with grades for each contribution, to ensure the alignment. However, the gap of expectations widen when the employee in question weighs every contribution for a material reward. A pat on the back received for managing an expert escalation would culminate to incentive, if that escalation results with client retention and revenue returns. The excellence of the employee would be best utilized by an higher level responsibility, when appropriate.

Communication: The guidance to an employee reverberates intently, with the shared views and thoughts from it leader with appropriate feedback. Transparency calls for its price. It pushes the leadership to share the confidential often sensitive information. This rings the choice to jump the boat or follow the captain.

Pen-ultimately, the priorities of choosing and aligning will glue the individual to the entity. Solution to the decision maker remains in acknowledging the human concerns with judicial treatment through strategies and communication. Employee championship is intertwined with business partnering through change management and administrative expertise.

If you have any HR Query or any query on Future of Work, Employee Engagement, Talent management, Women Empowerment, Retention or Business Strategy please write to me in here. Looking forward to learn more while finding solutions for you.

Nabomita is the Founder to Nabomita.com. She is the Top 100 Women Achiever Awardee, awarded by Government of India , TEDx Speaker, Quoted on ForbesUS, one of the Top 20 HR Influencer in Social Media as declared by SHRM India and one among the Top 100 Technology Influencer in India. Connect with her on @nabomita_smiles , Facebook Page and Google+

This article have been published on Business manager , October issue 2015. This issue covers different areas of Strategic Management.

Do you wish to be heard on issues that are close to your heart ? How about raising a cause to the highest authority in your country? Ministry of Women and Child Development invites you to be an Agent of Change and raise a cause. Wondering how would this work? Here’s more on this :

Union Minister Smt. Maneka Sanjay Gandhi has been the using the power of Social Media to reach out to citizens, both to resolve the issues related to women & children as well as to get new ideas from them as to how to make lives of women & children better. In its latest citizen-driven campaign, Ministry of Women & Child Development, has solicited volunteers to raise ‘causes’, which they want the Government to take up.

Citizens are invited to be Change Makers in promoting the interests of Women and Children in India. Let’s unlock the unique power of social crusaders among the people of India.

Ministry will collate the issues raised by people over a month-long Social Media Campaign. All the causes will then be screened by an expert panel comprising the concerned stakeholders and the Union Minister herself. The selected issues will be taken up by the Ministry of Women & Child Development to be addressed at policy level. Not only this, the ‘Top Agents of Change’ will also be duly acknowledged and rewarded by the Ministry.

The campaign can be followed on Facebook & Twitter of @MinistryWCD under the hashtag #WCDAgentsofChange. How to Raise a Cause?

Where does women stand, in the age financial meltdowns, geo-political differences and AI? 1 robot out of 4 factory workers in Maruti. The numbers looks even more interesting in totality with 2400 robots at Manesarand 5000 facility. Are we still competing with men for jobs and seats at Premier Institutes? Where does this lands us especially when women have lesser access to education and finances?

India ranks 87th in Global Gender Report 2016 with highest participation of women in education and health sector. Does this set any target for us? The report further showed that the highest level of penetration remains in the Education and Health sector with fewer women in Technology and Policy making !

With equal participation we can add upto 28 trillion by 2025 which is equal to a combination of US & China’s economy . So what do we need to build this equality ? What are the building blocks that can affect growth ? Law and order , financial independence and education?

These are few laws worldwide that instils sexism so deep that imagining equality remains light years away! When we restrict women legally how does it impact her participation socially rather financially?

World Economic Forum reports women remain unpaid for 50% of her productive time at work. How does this add up to her pay?

Global gender index shows Iceland, Finland and Norway tops the chart and not the leading economies! Why is it so? Is it the access to education and policies at work that makes it happen? Few days back when Maternity Benefit act was amended in India, we had people worrying about women no longer being hired. Norway offers 44 weeks of maternity leave. No wonder they have 47% of women participation in Public sector and 26% in the private sector! When we have family friendly policies at work, we are no longer forcing a women to choose between family and work

This tweet sums up the support , policies, access to education and finances that we need! Here we have an young woman as a pilot to Air India taking the same official commute with her mother who works as an air hostess! This organisation isn’t a nimble-foot startup. It is not a super funded private company with loads of money to spend. Yet, that’s how strongly they have been balancing diversity.

40 economies that participated in Global Entrepreneurship monitor reports women Entrepreneurship rate rose by 13% whereas it was 5% for males. However in India , the perceived opportunity for women is 41% compared to their male counterparts. Anusha, who celebrated her 25th Birthday recently pitched her second startup to me. And she is not in Bangalore or Mumbai but in Vishakhapatnam. Her first startup is running successfully in association with Andhra Pradesh Government. According Deloitte report, Millennial women are bridging the gender pay gap. Are we planning anything to bridge the financial gap for the ageing women workforce too?

Where does the empowerment needs to happen? Anuja Shukla, head of Google for entrepreneur runs a project on her on own where she gets girls from age 8-15 to code. Revathy Roy , founder Hey Didi , formerly Vira Cabs, have trained more than 10000 women from socially backward classes to drive. She created employment for them through her startup. She empowered them to own their vehicles and earn out it, offering loans from banks with no collateral. Urvashi Neogi runs her profitable Event Management firm, Biz Integration with her Geographically based team. She doesn’t need a 9-to-5 at an office with face time from her team members.

Here’s a research by Adobe on Future of Work which says, future lies in collaboration and diversity of skills. So what does this imply? In the age where commitment to the work and the speed of delivery remain the only measure at work, do we still need the archaical work design? Would the jobs of tomorrow offer women more potential to deliver? Will the organisations of tomorrow have the bandwidth to build the leaders of tomorrow irrespective of gender?

If you have any HR Query or any query on Future of Work, Employee Engagement, Talent management, Women Empowerment, Retention or Business Strategy please write to me in here. Looking forward to learn more while finding solutions for you. This have been re-blogged from nabomita.com

Nabomita is the Founder to Nabomita.com. She is the Top 100 Women Achiever Awardee, awarded by Government of India , TEDx Speaker, Quoted on ForbesUS, one of the Top 20 HR Influencer in Social Media as declared by SHRM India and one among the Top 100 Technology Influencer in India. Connect with her on @nabomita_smiles , Facebook Page and Google+